In our last article, we explored the role leadership plays in building the foundations for better employee and care outcomes. In part two, we explore how organisations can invest further in developing leaders and managers.
Developing Strong Leaders in Social Care
Great leadership doesn’t happen by chance. Organisations must actively invest in developing their managers and by approaching recruitment, onboarding and ongoing development with a clear plan. Let’s look at some key considerations:
Skills & Values-Based Recruitment
Implement a recruitment process that assesses both leadership skills and core values. Prioritise your key competencies, assess for them at interview – ensuring that you identify what good looks like before the interview. Tools including psychometric assessments, such as Care Character can help identify candidates with the right skills and values. Don’t stop at the recruitment process – make sure this is consistently mapped into ongoing reviews.
Comprehensive Onboarding
Provide new managers with a structured toolkit to set them up for success from day one including policies, compliance, and best practice guidelines. Setup mentorship pairings with experienced leaders to guide new managers through their transition. Real-life case studies and scenario-based training will help to prepare managers for challenges they may face in their role. When it comes to clear expectations and performance goals, ensure managers understand their responsibilities and how success is measured.
Ongoing Leadership Training
Prioritise continuous professional development for your management team. Offer formal development programmes focusing on those key skills including communication, conflict resolution, decision making and resilience. Provide coaching and mentorship programmes to enhance leadership capabilities. Look at workshops and peer learning opportunities that enable managers to learn from each other and share best practice. Don’t forget to host regular refresher training – encouraging self-learning and ownership on seeking out learning opportunities.
Find leadership development programmes, tools and resources via Skills for Care.
Encouraging Reflective Practice
Encourage self-evaluation tools where managers assess their leadership style, strengths, and areas for improvement. Provide structured feedback sessions, including 360-degree feedback from peers, staff, and the people cared for and supported. Promote reflective logs to help managers process experiences and challenges. Offer supervision and debriefing sessions where leaders can discuss difficult cases and learn from experiences.
Nurturing Future Leaders
Identify high-potential staff and create clear career pathways to develop the next generation of social care leaders. Offer leadership shadowing opportunities so aspiring frontline team members can gain firsthand experience. Many providers will offer professional qualifications in leadership and management – but are they tailored to your organisation, ways of working and values?
Engage and Retain
Engage with new managers and seek their feedback, find out how they are getting on and any support required. Regular check-ins to assess wellbeing, workload, and any challenges. Retention and stay interviews should be conducted – ideally by an independent third party – to understand job satisfaction, career aspirations, and any support needed. Recognition and rewards programmes will support to acknowledge contributions and maintain motivation. Ask yourself and others – are we a supportive workplace culture that champions professional growth, work-life balance, and employee wellbeing?
What’s it all about?
Leadership isn’t just about management – it’s about inspiring change, improving care standards, and building strong, motivated teams. In social care, the impact of great leadership is felt at every level, from frontline teams to the people being cared for and supported who rely on compassionate, skilled support.
At Cohesion, we’re specialists in recruiting leadership and management teams in care – and we know the drivers for better retention outcomes. Whether you’re looking for your next management hire, an effective assessment tool, or want to explore our retention solutions, we can help. Get in touch today to speak with one of our experts.
